Winter cod in shallow kelp bays are a special kind of fight: powerful takes in tight water, sudden runs through weed and rocks, and that stubborn way they hug structure. Over the years I’ve learned that a properly built microchum slick will hold a bait in the kelp fringe long enough to tempt...
Read more...
How-To Guides
Marina lights are one of those relentless, honest attractors: they concentrate...
Tackle Reviews
I used to curse pebble spits. Nothing fills you with more quiet frustration...
How-To Guides
On Fishing In Wales Co I’m always looking for simple, repeatable ways to find...
How-To Guides
Fishing kelp banks for cod at night is one of my favourite challenges — the...
On Fishing In Wales Co I’m always looking for simple, repeatable ways to find fish without relying on luck. One method that’s become a staple of my shore approach combines old-school observation — gull behaviour and foam lines — with a...
Fishing kelp banks for cod at night is one of my favourite challenges — the tide smells different, the headlamp cuts through the darkness and every bite feels earned. Deadbait is my go-to when the water cools and cod move onto the weed to feed....
I’ve spent more early mornings than I can count sitting on slick rocks in Welsh harbours, watching sleek mackerel blitz the surface and nicking my lures before the pollack even show interest. Over the years I’ve developed a feathered teaser rig...
I’d been fighting kite-tailing for months on exposed pebble spits before I finally fixed it by switching to a 20g sliding bomb and a 50lb fluorocarbon leader. It felt like one of those small, stubborn problems that becomes huge the more you...
I walked the pontoon at low tide the first time I noticed how lights change everything. Under marina lamps the estuary becomes a corridor of silhouettes and suspended life — fry and shrimps schooling in the glow, small crabs skittering along...
I fish a lot of soft sand for sole around the Welsh coast, and over the years I’ve refined a simple shore rig that presents a whole lugworm exactly how the flat fish like it — low, drifting naturally with the tide, and sitting just off the...
I remember the first evening I tried the 6in sabiki on an ultralight spinning reel: three quick rattles of the rod and the surface exploded with mackerel. What had previously been a slo-mo parade of single grabs and missed opportunities suddenly...
Winter cod in shallow kelp bays can be maddeningly localised. I’ve lost count of mornings where I sit on the rocks watching kelp fronds barely move, thinking there’s nothing happening — then, after a well-timed chum slick, the bay comes alive...
I watch kelp the way some anglers watch lines on their reels. On exposed rocky points where pollack hunt, the subtlest ripple, the way a frond flips or the direction of a kelp "stream" can tell me where a fish is lying in wait. Over the years I've...
I fish estuaries a lot for bass, and low tide is one of those quiet windows where the cunning ones show their true colours. Over the years I’ve learned that changing the profile of a soft plastic at low water—sometimes subtly, sometimes...